The Property Podcast

The Property Podcast is the podcast for all property investors, new or experienced. Rob Bence and Rob Dix discuss a different property topic and property news item every week, passing on their knowledge and experience to the listeners. They both invest in UK property so they practise what they preach. No hard sell, no bull, just straight-talking property investment advice!

Resource of the week

This week's resource is a Trello board, which is the template we use when we're executing the hiring process we talk about in this episode. Take it, make whatever modifications you want, and you'll find that it makes it way easier to keep track of where you're up to with all your applications.

And as an extra bonus resource, Rob B was on the Graduate Jobs podcast talking about how to land a job in property – so if you're seeking a role rather than hiring for one, make sure you check out his words of wisdom.

News this week

Don't forget to register for a meetup!

Next week will be the first Thursday of the month, which means...it's meetup time again!

There are over 30 meetups taking place, and they're totally free. All you need to do is find one near you, put your name down, and turn up for an evening of friendly and informative chat with other property obsessives.

In this week's episode, Rob & Rob talk about getting a mortgage when you're not yet a property owner. Rob B says that there are a lot of mortgage lenders out there, but as a non home owner, and not yet a property investor, the pool of products available are actually quite small.

Rob B goes on to say that in 6 months time there will be more options. Both Rob and Rob discuss the options available to you and say how important it is to have a good mortgage advisor.

This week it's all about the money, as we explore alternative ways to raise funds for your property investments.

We explore the pros and cons of using:

Credit cards (!)

Bridging finance

Private finance

Joint ventures

Second charge loans

Each funding source we discuss could be (and most will be) a separate episode in itself – but in this value-packed episode we give you a quick run-through of the different strategies you might want to have in your kit, and how to decide which is the right tool for the job.

Resource of the week

You've probably rhetorically asked yourself, "where did today go?" – but with Toggl, you can actually look back and check.

It's a time-tracking tool (that integrates nicely with Chrome) that makes it easy to monitor the amount of time you spend on different tasks and projects. It involves some manual work and discipline, but the act of being mindful of your time can be beneficial in itself – and Toggl gives you reports that you can dig into to review your biggest time-sucks.

Certainly this won't be for everyone – but if you feel like you'd benefit from the insight of knowing how you spend your days, Toggl is a great (and free) way of doing it.

News this week

As reported in The Telegraph, six commercial property funds have suspended trading – basically meaning that investors aren't allowed to take their money out.

We discuss the nature of different types of funds, and what (if anything) this news tells us about the future of commercial property.

In this week's episode, Rob & Rob discuss the pros and cons of buying a home or an investment property.

Tony has been living overseas and is looking to return to the UK with his young family - he doesn't have enough to buy in the location the family want to live and he wants to know whether to buy an investment property instead.

Rob B starts off by addressing the pros of investing in a property, then renting a home to live in. He says that if you're moving to a new area, renting will give you a chance to see if the area is actually right for you. He then goes on to say that you can build your asset base by investing in property, then use your capital to invest back into buying your own home, leading to a double win.

Rob D talks about shaking off the mindset of "You have to own your own home", and goes on to cover some of the advantage of owning your own property, such as accessing more mortgage options.

You buy your property, you put a tenant in and take their first month's rent, you check your bank account a month later and...nothing.

Your tenant has fallen into arrears...and how you handle it could make the difference between a swift resolution and months with no income. In this episode, we take you step-by-step through the process of dealing with every investor's nightmare scenario.

We discuss:

How to handle those first few days when the rent hasn't arrived as expected

The importance of fulfilling your obligations in case you need to take legal action

The two legal routes that you need to choose between to get the tenant out and recover the arrears

What the court process involves, step-by-step, and how long you can expect it to take

Resource of the week

If you're anything like Rob B, your wallet is bulging with receipts rather than banknotes – and you're either letting expenses go unclaimed, or having to buy your bookkeeper one heck of a Christmas present.

Luckily, Receipt Bank can come to your rescue: all you need to do is take a photo of the receipt on your phone, and it'll store it securely for you. It'll even extract all the key data ready for automatic uploading to your cloud accounts package like Sage, Xero or Kashflow.

The best thing is the easier the process of dealing with your receipts is, the more likely you are to actually do it – which means you won't be paying too much tax as a result of overlooking legitimate expenses.

News this week

Buy-to-let mortgage rates are falling in response to the slowdown in lending demand after the stamp duty increase – and more lenders have been cutting their rates in the wake of the EU referendum.

Not only that, but the Bank of England has relaxed capital requirements for banks – freeing up £150 billion of potential funding for lending.

What does this mean? Well, cheap and easy money tends to mean higher asset prices as the funds have to go somewhere – and it also means that the lessons of the previous crash have been forgotten. This is exactly what the property cycle tells us should happen – so once we come out of the mid-cycle dip, we know what's meant to happen next...

Vote to have the Summit come to you!

In October we're holding our first ever Property Hub Summit outside London – and you get to choose where it is!

There's still time to swing it in the favour of your chosen city – there are several gathering plenty of votes, but it's too close to call right now...

That's the question we attempt to answer in this week's episode. What happens next in general, what happens next for the property market in particular...and perhaps more importantly, what general lessons can we take away from the whole thing?

We discuss:

What's happened during the last couple of weeks since the result

What it means for property in London – and the UK market in general

What to absolutely not do now as an investor

Where there might be opportunities to profit from uncertainty

The psychology of investors, and what Brexit can teach us about preparing for future major events